In Midsomer Wellow, the church bell-ringers are being murdered one by one. In hopes of winning a national striking competition, the determined bell group continues with rehearsals despite the growing number of deaths. As each is murdered, the killer leaves a line from a nursery rhyme by the body, though one of these notes has been altered to allude to a long-ago incident in Midsomer Wellow's past. Barnaby and Troy must find the connection between this note and a past Midsomer Wellow murder to stop one villager's quest for bloody revenge.